


Inner Demons

by dragonq666



Category: Birds of Prey (And the Fantabulous Emancipation of One Harley Quinn) (2020)
Genre: Angst and Hurt/Comfort, F/F, Minor Character Death
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-10-27
Updated: 2020-10-27
Packaged: 2021-03-08 23:21:45
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 811
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27224947
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/dragonq666/pseuds/dragonq666
Summary: Inner demons... rage, growl, and tear the soul to shreds.
Relationships: Helena Bertinelli/Dinah Lance
Kudos: 21





	Inner Demons

People all have their own inner demons. Their essence is the same, but their disguises are different.

The objective of these demons is to torment the host, to disturb him to sleep, do not give concentrate on anything, to raise from the depths of the subconscious thoughts about all the bad things in life: death, pain they have caused to their loved ones. They interfere with life, torment the mind, drive people crazy…

Everyone has them, but it seems to Helena that she has the most.

Demons can look like your best friend or your worst enemy, like a child or an adult. They take on any appearance, sometimes the most unexpected, like a favorite actor or a kitten that died twenty years ago. They always appear at the most inopportune moment and immediately take hold of a person, he may scream, cry, may be silent, but he may not give a hint of what is happening inside him-it all depends on his self-control.

Helena's demons aren't the same people she killed; that's what anyone would think, but it's different. Helena's demons are her mother, father, and younger brother. They come at night and whisper in her ear: "You could have saved us, tesoro, why didn't you save us?» Pino leans closer, his disembodied lips almost touching her skin, demanding: "Why did you survive and I didn't?»

The Huntress covers her ears with her hands and hides her head under the pillow, so as not to hear these quiet but insistent voices. Every night, she tosses and turns in her bed, rumpling the sheets, and falls asleep, completely exhausted, only in the morning. But during the day, she tries to look like she doesn't have insomnia at all. And so on for several years. She's getting tired.

She's focused on her job: making Gotham clean of evil, and she doesn't see anything else around her, so she doesn't notice the excited looks Dinah throws at her. Up to the moment until a Canary is not directly asks her what happened. Helena frowns uncomprehendingly.

"What do you mean?"

"About the rise in oil prices," Dinah rolls her eyes, "About what you care about, of course!"

Helena looks down at the ground and hesitates a little.

"It's all right."

Dinah looks at her incredulously, sighs and turns away, and Helena feels a worm of guilt stirring inside her, though why should she? She wasn't used to discussing her problems with anyone, or even admitting that the same problem Dinah had asked about existed.

...she thinks they're right. Helena and only she is to blame for what happened, that she did not prevent it, did not protect it, did not save it. And she doesn't care that she was only nine years old and had nothing to do with it at all, it was her fault, and she deserves to be tormented by the shadows.

But there's one other thing that bothers her. She seems to have fallen in love with Dinah. She thinks so. This can't be serious, can it? They are friends, and everything that happens between her and the Canary, she considers friendship… But after one drunken kiss, she begins to doubt her feelings as exclusively friendly. Hell, she'd never had any of those friends, so how would she even know what they were?

And it's getting harder to say okay to all of Dinah's questions about how she's doing. The Huntress is afraid of losing her temper. And, in the end, it breaks down. And as soon as those words leave Dinah's mouth, she jumps up and realizes that she's starting to get angry. On herself. And growls:

"Am I okay? I'm not okay! Every time I go out on the street at night and kick criminals' asses, I'm not doing it for the civilians of Gotham, it's much more selfish! I do it for myself! So I want to pay off my guilt to my parents, to my brother! I don't want to hear their voices at night anymore…"

Helena lowers her head, burying her fingers in her hair, and begins to run around the hangar. At one point, Dinah catches her and turns her by the shoulders to face her, gently asking, looking straight in the eyes:

"Why do you feel guilty?"

"Because I survived," Helena whispers, "And they didn't. They say it's my fault. They come at night…"

"H, listen," Dinah begins, running a finger lightly over his sunken cheek. "I didn't know them, but it seems to me that they wouldn't have thought so. Those who appear to you are not your family. I'm sure your brother and parents are happy that you survived, and they want you to go on living instead of tormenting yourself. I'm sure they love you. As I do."

That night, for the first time in fifteen years, Helena sleeps peacefully.


End file.
